‘Justice League’ movie hopes to finally bring Batman and together on screen

If teaming up worked for Iron Man, Thor and The Hulk, it has to work for Batman, , and Wonder Woman, right?

Warner Bros. Pictures seems to think so, as Variety reported yesterday that the studio has hired a new writer to bring DC Comics' "Justice League" to the big screen. Just as "The Avengers" assembled the biggest heroes from Marvel Comics, "Justice League" would see DC's iconic characters joining forces to save the world. (DC Comics is a division of Warner Bros. Entertainment.) The fact that "The Avengers" is now the third highest-grossing film of all time with $1.3 billion worldwide seems to have reignited the fire to get the other legendary superhero team up on movie screens.
[Related: Christian Bale gets emotional remembering Heath Ledger]

Variety's report states that Will Beall, who wrote the upcoming "Gangster Squad" (starring Ryan Gosling and Josh Brolin) for Warner Bros., has been hired to take on the screenplay. Beall previously wrote for TV's "Castle," but he has also been announced as the writer for new movie versions of "Logan's Run" and "Lethal Weapon 5."

While interest in a "Justice League" movie has certainly been rekindled by the record-breaking success of "The Avengers," the project has been in the works for several years. Director George Miller ("Mad Max," "Happy Feet") was hired for the film in the fall of 2007, with production scheduled to begin the next year for a planned 2009 release.

The original plan was to have a completely fresh cast of actors take on the comic book roles, separate from any existing franchise. Unlike "The Avengers," where the original stars returned, this would have a different cast (so no Christian Bale as Batman). At the time, Armie Hammer ("The Social Network") was attached to play Batman, with D.J. Cotrona as , Adam Brody as the Flash, and Megan Gale as Wonder Woman.

The Writer's Guild strike in late 2007 put a halt to the project, however. The production went into an indefinite hiatus, with George Miller moving on to a new "Mad Max" reboot, which is scheduled to start filming soon. In the intervening years, Warner Bros. released the disappointing "Green Lantern," with "The Dark Knight Rises" coming this summer and the new film "The Man of Steel" slated for next June.

That wasn't the first time Warner Bros. tried and failed to get DC's heaviest hitters together in one movie. In the early 2000s, the studio developed "Batman Vs. ," which would have pitted the two heroes against each other (though in the end they would team up to take on Lex Luthor). Josh Hartnett was rumored for , with Colin Farrell considered for Batman. But that was eventually shelved in favor of Christopher Nolan's "Batman Begins."

Currently, there isn't a director, cast or release date for "Justice League," but summer of 2014 seems like it would be the earliest we could expect to see it. There are also a host of individual DC superhero movies in development, including the Flash, Wonder Woman, and Lobo.

It's also unclear if Warner Bros. still plans to keep the "Justice League" as a separate continuity from the standalone movies, or integrate them the way Marvel built up to "The Avengers." When Joss Whedon, the director of "The Avengers" was asked if he had any advice for the people making "Justice League," he jokingly answered, "Call me." He followed it by saying that it's harder to bring DC characters to the screen than Marvel since they are "from an old, bygone era" where heroes were less flawed and grounded. And Whedon would know, since he tried to bring "Wonder Woman" to the screen in another project that stalled out several years ago.

UPDATE: Mark Millar, the writer who created the comic books the inspired the movies "Wanted" and "Kick-Ass," posted on his official website MillarWorld.tv that someone he knows is friends with screenwriter Will Beall and got a peek at the unfinished "Justice League" script. Millar reported that the new take on the movie is "Very real-world and not at all what you might expect." He said Beall began working on the script before "The Avengers" hit theaters, and that the "tidbits I heard sound quite dark and mature, which isn't what I expected."

Sounds like a pretty lightweight cast they had planned. That isn't going to get anybody excited. The Wonder Woman they had planned has an acting resume of three forgettable minor movies in nine years.

He's not a perfect human. Humans do not jump 50ft down out of trees, and blast the sand out of punching bags. He has the strength of 20 men, and is as durable as an Oak tree. You're not going to like this, but him fighting Batman would be like him fighting a 12 yr old. Batman might use some device to take him down, but Batman really IS just a man. Cap is a Super Soldier.

There are some extraordinary humans out there that can do amazing things. No one truly knows the limits of human potential so they can take liberties when showing off Cap's abilities. Not to mention they're fake; they're comic books.

Yes, Cap has feats that would appear to put him in the superhuman category, but so does Batman and a lot of other human crime fighters. Officially speaking, Cap is just the perfect human. He's as strong, fast and agile as a human could ever be while the super soldier serum grants him prolonged endurance.

Meanwhile Batman has supposedly trained himself to the peak of human potential, but realistically speaking he'd have genetic limitations. He would get his ass handed to him by Captain America.

If Doomsday can knock Supes into a healing coma, who's to say the the hulk couldn't.
The Hulk is supposed to be as strong as anything or anyone in any universe. Supposedly immeasurably strong.
Funny how we're all getting geeked out about this stuff. I loved comics when I was a kid. This is fun.32 yrs old talking about who would win in an inter-comic universe fight.

vs The Professor (hyper intelligent Hulk) and Hulk wins in a landslide.

There are different versions of too. There's the original version, who was much less strong and couldn't fly. There's also the 1950s version, who could move planets and fly at the speed of light.

But I think most versions of could get the Hulk into space, at which point the Hulk wouldn't have anything to push against and could gently push him into the sun. Of course wouldn't do that, so compassion is his Achilles' heel in this case.

There are different versions of too. There's the original version, who was much less strong and couldn't fly. There's also the 1950s version, who could move planets and fly at the speed of light.

But I think most versions of could get the Hulk into space, at which point the Hulk wouldn't have anything to push against and could gently push him into the sun. Of course wouldn't do that, so compassion is his Achilles' heel in this case.

The Hulk has survived the destruction of a planet and the heat of a star's core. Not sure what pushing him into the sun would do....

An intelligent Hulk simply leaps off to grab some kryptonite and shoves it square in 's bung.

They are evenly matched on brute force... Hulk (the smart one) is far far more intelligent.. he also has a less stringent moral code... whereas has a glaring weakness in regards to kryptonite... seems like a pretty clear win for Hulk.

The Hulk has survived the destruction of a planet and the heat of a star's core. Not sure what pushing him into the sun would do....

An intelligent Hulk simply leaps off to grab some kryptonite and shoves it square in 's bung.

They are evenly matched on brute force... Hulk (the smart one) is far far more intelligent.. he also has a less stringent moral code... whereas has a glaring weakness in regards to kryptonite... seems like a pretty clear win for Hulk.

superman is as fast as flash and as strong as the hulk

That speed makes all the difference IF superman would really try to win

The Hulk has survived the destruction of a planet and the heat of a star's core. Not sure what pushing him into the sun would do....

An intelligent Hulk simply leaps off to grab some kryptonite and shoves it square in Superman's bung.

They are evenly matched on brute force... Hulk (the smart one) is far far more intelligent.. he also has a less stringent moral code... whereas Superman has a glaring weakness in regards to kryptonite... seems like a pretty clear win for Hulk.

You're cherry picking the best version of the Hulk to face the standard version of Superman. There are versions of Superman that don't have a vulnerability to Kryptonite, plus the 50s version who is so ridiculously overpowered that he could practically do anything. Plus the Hulk is from a different universe where Kryptonite doesn't exist, so he has no way of knowing about it.

Then even if Hulk somehow figures out that this substance that he's never seen or heard of is the key to defeating Superman, how does he get away from Superman long enough to find or make some? Keep in mind that Superman is (at the very least) almost as strong as the Hulk and much much faster. Hulk jumps away to find Kryptonite, Superman zips under him and knocks him into space, game over.

I've never heard of a story where the Hulk survives the core of a star, but even if he could I don't know how he could escape it. And even if he could do that, Superman could just leave him in deep space to ineffectually thrash around.